Another World, Some Other Time
by Jael K
Summary: When the WaveRider hops dimensions, the Legends ... especially one in particular ... are in for a surprise. (Or maybe two ...) An Earth2 story inspired by the mere fact that someone surnamed "Snart" is the mayor of Central City there. Again, as always, CaptainCanary.
1. Chapter 1

Same basic timeline as "All Through the Night" and "Homecoming."

This takes place a few months _before_ the Flash's first visit to Earth2. Hey, it's time travel; it's possible.

I own neither the show(s) nor the characters.

XXX

 _Another world, some other time_

 _You lay your sanity on the line_

 _Familiar faces, familiar sights_

 _Reach back, remember, with all your might_

 _And there she stands, in a silken gown_

 _Silver lights shining down_

(Lyrics from "Love Walks In," Van Halen. I am old.)

XXX

xx

x

"I. Am. What?"

Hunter lays the newspaper gently down on the table with a sigh. "It would appear, Mr. Snart, that you are the mayor."

When the latest round of bounty hunters attacked, they'd damaged the WaveRider enough to send it spinning wildly out of control. Hunter, trying desperately to steer it back to a familiar time, managed to home in on 2016 ... but then, in a flash of blinding light, they were suddenly in a Central City both familiar ... and not.

Which is how they'd all learned it was possible for the ship to hop dimensions.

"It was theory only!" Hunter said in protest to all the dismayed, angry, and perplexed faces around him. "The variables ... the odds were astronomical."

"Can we get back?" Sara, ever practical.

Their erstwhile captain ran a hand through his hair in frustration. "Yes. Yes, I think so. We're going to need a little more information, though."

Given that they're stuck in a very unfamiliar version of their own world, with a timeline that could be wildly different, Gideon has no information to give them. The AI is even having trouble tapping into local news broadcasts; something to do with the technology having evolved in a slightly different way.

Jax, as the youngest and thus, in theory, the least likely to have a recognizable alternate identity, was sent out to find a newspaper. He returned relatively quickly, paper in hand, a look mingling amazement and a certain evil glee on his face. It was nothing compared to the expression on Snart's.

The team gathers around the paper and table to consider the page 1 headline - "Mayor Snart blasts police critics" –- and the full-color photograph of what is unmistakably the perfect doppelganger of the team crook.

Kendra is trying to conceal a smile. "Glasses? Do you wear contacts?"

He doesn't answer. His expression, Sara thinks, is a strange combination of mortification, annoyance, and something less definable.

"So, is this some strange 'bizarro' world or something we've landed in?" Jax's amusement has changed to discomfort. "We're all the opposite of what, well, we are?"

"I suppose it's debatable whether we're talking 'opposites' here, given that there's not generally a big difference between crooks and politicans." Snart finally speaks, leveling a stony gaze at Jax, who has the grace to look a trifle abashed. "I'd guess it's more complicated than that."

"Likely," Hunter acknowledges. "We do have some limited information on the alternate Earths that have been visited and recorded. What we can do next is simply try to pin down some of the variables. Then Gideon may be able to get us back."

Everyone looks at Snart.

They've been through the paper inside and out; there's only an indication of the one identity in its pages, and Gideon still hasn't figured out the dimensional broadcasts. Hunter needs to stay with the ship. Unless they want to send out someone whose alternative is an utter mystery, with all the disasters that could entail, they only have one option.

"Well," Hunter says finally. "Congratulations, Mr. Snart. It looks like you've just won office."

xxx

Gideon whips him up an ebony suit that matches the one in the photo and looks profoundly mayoral ... and, if Sara cares to admit it, pretty damned good.

She leans against the doorway and watches him straighten his tie, smiling a little, but at the same time, somewhat disturbed. She can't say precisely what about this situation has her so nervy, but she knows to trust her instincts.

"I don't like this. You shouldn't be going out there alone."

He gives his tie a final twitch before turning from the mirror. Conceited ass. "Any one of you could be someone who identity could completely blow our cover."

"I lived in Star City, not Central City. Chances are, no one knows me here." If I'm alive at all, she adds silently. It seems all too likely that she's not. "Are you OK with this?"

He's watching her with an odd expression, then offers her a truth he wouldn't have offered to anyone else on the team. "It's ... unsettling. Why is this ... Leonard Snart ... so different? Is he just a crook in politician's clothing? I don't know."

She wonders, briefly, what a Sara Lance who never went on the Gambit would be like. "I hear you." They stand in silence for a few moments. Finally, he pops his earpiece in, gives her one of those trademarked intense looks, and walks past her toward the door. She follows.

xxx

The consensus is that, for once, the simpler the better. Snart will confront his equivalent on his own (preferably without said equivalent ever really seeing him), jab him with a trank, and simply take his place for a short time. It seems the mayor tends to attend meetings off site Friday afternoons, then go back to the office for a bit, so he's loitering in a parking garage by city hall, waiting for his double to arrive for his pre-weekend check-in.

Close to the spot marked "mayor," there's a convenient corner just outside the range of the cameras. It's a good place to wait ... and when this world's Leonard Snart pulls into his spot and emerges from his black sports car, his double is able to disable the camera just long enough to jab the man in the neck, then drag him back and tuck him nearly into his car without too much muss or fuss.

He'll never admit it, but Snart studies his opposite number intently as he folds the other man back into the rear seat of his sharp car. (Let's hear it for tinted windows.) There seems to be little discernible difference to a cursory inspection. He frowns a little, though, as he notices a few small, round scars on his counterpart's hands and wrist.

So his dad was a shit father here, too. The thought disturbs him.

Hunter is demanding information over the earpiece. This is the last thing he wants to deal with.

"Got him," he mutters tersely. "He's fine, taking a nap, didn't even see me. Get off my back."

No one bats an eyelash as he strolls into city hall. The location of the mayor's office is well marked. He nods to the security guard, makes a mild comment to the woman who is apparently his receptionist, and, making use of the keys he'd lifted from this double, saunters into the office of Leonard Snart, mayor of Central City, as if he owns it.

Unnerving.

Hunter is yammering again. "I'm in," he reports. "Now shut up and let me do this."

The office is relatively spare. Some things, apparently, transcend worlds.

He's oddly reluctant to rifle his counterpart's desk. Still, that's sort of part of the mission. The technology is cosmetically different ... vertical screens ... but internally very similar. He runs a few searches for world news on the computer while looking at a few files and clippings easily found in the top drawers.

Apparently, his father here died ... while still a cop, before any wrongdoing had come to light. He scans the old, yellowed newsprint avidly, wondering that the man keeps them here. The timeline is tweaked. Lisa still exists, apparently a little older here; she's mentioned in the obit. Scars or no scars, apparently his father stayed on the overall straight and narrow a little longer here. (Or at least, didn't get caught.) And then he died, taking a bullet in a shoot-out, a hero at least in name.

As he said. Unnerving.

Profoundly unsettled, he tucks the clips back in the desk, then runs a few more searches for less personal details about this Central City, this Earth, things Hunter can use to pin down this variant world. (Atlantis. Interesting.)

While the hastily compiled file is printing, he inspects the diplomas he finds on the walls. (No personal photos. He's apparently not really that kind of guy here, either.) Law school, high honors. Bachelor's in history. An associate's degree from the local community college, up there almost defiantly with the higher honors.

He's just tucked the printouts away when the voice of the secretary comes over the intercom.

"Mr. Snart? Your fiancée is here. You're running a little late for the police benefit."

Your **what**?

He's frozen for a moment before he manages to choke out an acknowledgement.

There's nowhere else to go from this office; he has no choice. With trepidation, he returns to the main hall.

There's a woman standing there. She's wearing a long, black, silken gown, arms bare, her hair pinned up on her head elegantly, the silvery lights shining down on her slim, strong form.

She turns to face him.

And she is Sara Lance.

The breath freezes in his lungs, and he just stares at her.

Then, he turns off his comm unit.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note** _: Second of three chapters._

xxx

"Mr. Snart? Mr. Snart? What was that?" Radio silence. "Goddammit!"

Hunter is stressed about being here; they all are. But privately, Sara thinks that badgering the man who'd been so obviously uncomfortable with this mission had pretty much guaranteed something like this was going to happen. "What did that voice say?"

"I couldn't quite make it out." Hunter frowns at thin air in frustration. "It didn't sound like trouble. But you and I both know that trouble tends to find Mr. Snart."

True enough. "I'm going out there." She holds up a hand to forestall any arguments. "No one's going to see me if I don't want them to, OK? I can't just stand here wondering."

Hunter protests, and Hunter lists reasons why she shouldn't, and, in the end, Hunter can't stop her.

xxx

"Well, I thought I looked nice, but you look like someone just hit you in the head with a board. Your jaw _dropped_."

She's right. (And sounds pleased about it.) With an effort, he picks it back up. Manages a "You look lovely."

And she does. She looks beyond lovely, actually. But she's walking toward him now and it's patently obvious that this is not his ... not Sara ... not the Sara she knows. She moves in a completely different way. And, yes, he'll admit being a bit of a student of the way _she_ moves, he has eyes after all, and ...

But at that point, she reaches him, grabs his tie, pulls his head down, and kisses him soundly.

For a fraction of a second, he just reacts; he can't help it. Then the twin thoughts of "the real Sara Lance can kill a man for _**days**_ " and "I'm not the man this woman thinks I am" catch up to his brain and effectively throw ice water over his libido. He breaks the kiss.

A little ice water. Certain parts take long to get the message than others.

The kiss is still long enough to draw a giggle from the receptionist and a chuckle from the security guard. Somewhere beyond his distraction, he notes his double must be on decent terms with them.

This Sara Lance is giving him a slightly odd look. He can't really blame her; he suspects he continues to look like he was hit in the head by a 2-by-4.

But she speaks. "It's a lovely evening out; I thought you might like to walk. Are you done here for the day? We're a little late."

Yes, he'd like to walk, considering that going back to the car would cause some problems. What he'd like better is to find a way to slip away (so he tells himself), but that doesn't seem possible at the moment.

He returns to turn off the computer and lock up the office, taking the moment to hunt for any reference at all to whatever lions' den he's about to walk in to. There's a folded flyer noting an event to benefit the Police Benevolent Society and he marks the address. Given that that's probably how he ... this "he" ... came by his college education, it makes sense he'd be sure to go. (And it's probably the proper mayoral thing to do anyway, isn't it?)

Then, with one last glance at the newspaper clippings, he returns to the lobby and woman who's waiting for him.

Sort of.

xxx

Sara has found a good vantage point from which to watch the front doors of city hall. Granted, if he's entering or exiting through the parking garage as per the plan, she won't see him, but this should at least let her know if there's any sort of chaos involved. There so often is.

She hasn't been ensconced on the rooftop for long when she sees him strolling down the steps ... with a woman on his arm.

Oh, is _that_ why he turned off the earpiece? Amusement bubbles up, warring with annoyance. She's actually been a little worried, and _this_ is what he's been up to?

Then she takes a closer look through her scope.

There's discomfort, of an odd sort, there in the way he's walking, the constant glances from side to side. She supposes she can understand that, considering the familiar way the woman is holding his arm, unaware of the fact that this is probably not the man she thinks he is.

Then she focuses on the woman .. and stops breathing.

But only for a moment. Then she's moving, one her way back to the WaveRider, a plan formulating in her head.

It's better than thinking too much right now.

xxx

This Sara Lance, it appears, has lived in Central City for quite some time. Moved there right out of college, from what he can tell.

Any number of people (from the city schools superintendent to what seems to be a still-friendly ex-girlfriend) greet her on their 10-minute stroll to the benefit venue, and he's able to quickly figure out she's a sort of minor city power in her own right. She seems to be the director of the Central City YWCA, involved in issues of anti-domestic violence programs and legislation, women's rights and health, and children's education programs. A very intriguing woman in her own right.

But not the Sara he knows.

His double and this world's Sara seem to be well liked. People don't try to get chatty with him like they do with her – thank god – but he does tend to get smiles and nods.

How very strange.

At first, there are a few times he has to catch himself on a snarky comment to the woman next to him, something the woman **he** knows would respond to with a smirk or a smart-ass comment of her own. This woman wouldn't respond that way; she'd be puzzled, or maybe even annoyed.

They seem to be happy together; his double and her double, but they're not the same people. They haven't had the same lives. No doubt they have their own resonance, but it's not the same.

He thinks perhaps this Sara Lance is sensing something of his discomfort – she's given him a few sideways glances. But she doesn't say anything, and when they arrive at the Central City banquet hall, she slides her hand down to clasp his.

She doesn't have the calluses of the martial artist he knows. It's distracting in several different ways.

He knows he has to get out of here. He still has several hours before the man in the car wakes, but the longer he spending swimming in this particular shark tank, the more likely it is he'll slip up.

And, while he can admit that the notion of spending some time with the woman currently holding his hand had been an alluring one, he can also admit not that ... well, this is not the woman he wants to spend that time with.

It's an uncomfortable thought.

They're greeted at the door like the power couple they apparently are, walk into the hall with heads turning all around them. Other Sara gives him a smile that's so sparkling he smiles back to see it, but further down, it evokes sorrow.

Was his ... was the Sara he knows ever this open, this happy? He doesn't know, though he hopes for her sake that she had that, once upon a time.

That said, he likes her shadows. They're part of her, earned through survival and pain. You can't get rid of them, so you just appreciate the depth they bring.

Other Sara snaps him out of his somewhat melancholy ... and unsettling ... thoughts with a squeeze of her hand.

"I see Iris over there and I need to talk to her for a moment. I'll be back in a minute." Suddenly, there's a spark of mischief in her eyes, and she could almost be the Sara he knows. "Try not to piss off half the City Council this time, OK? Remember how much you hate damage control. And that most of them are incapable of processing sarcasm anyway."

Maybe his double's not as dissimilar as he thought. He snags two glasses of champagne from a passing waiter, hands one to her, and lifts the other in a mocking toast. She laughs out loud, takes a sip, and turns away to head toward ... is that Iris West?

He's pretty sure it is, actually. His practiced eye immediately pegs this incarnation as a cop. Hmm. And then where is ...

Seriously?

He can't stop the smirk that crosses his face at the sight of this world's Barry Allen, all bow tie and wire-rimmed glasses, hovering by West's shoulder.

If that kid's a speedster here, he'll eat his tie. He apparently got the girl, though, so good for him.

His eyes light on Sara, who is talking with animation to West. The light is catching the diamond solitaire she wears on her left hand.

He turns away abruptly then, heading for the balcony he sees ringing the ballroom. It's likely he'll be accosted by any of these circling sharks there.

He really doesn't want to mess things up for these two.

He will not analyze that feeling too closely. But leaning against the railing upstairs, looking absently out at the glittering throng, he wonders how they met. It had nothing to do with TimeMasters and immortal psychopaths, he's pretty sure. Through work, probably; the crusader and the politician who understands why her work is important. Who knows.

Time passes while he's alone with his thoughts. He scans the crowd again.

Where _is_ she?

He's just starting to worry – this is not _his_ Sara, after all – when he sees her emerge from one of the corridors leading off from the main room, scanning the crowd.

And it _is_.

Sara.


	3. Chapter 3

He's down the staircase before he can blink, and she marks him almost immediately, crosses the floor to him, unsmiling.

Until he leans close and murmurs in her ear, "Thank god."

She registers his recognition immediately, and her lips curve in an involuntary smile. "How'd you know it was me?" she asks, just under her breath.

He's not going to tell her it's all in how she moves. Or that he's a student thereof. "Where is she?"

"Taking a nap. In the car with other you. I stopped to find it and drive it to the event center parking garage. They're fine; they're going to lose hours; they won't remember any of this."

"So ... we should leave?" Now he's oddly disappointed.

"Well, we shouldn't mess things up too much, even if it's not our world or timeline." She takes a sip of her champagne, eyes on his. "You ... other you ... is up for reelection soon, after all."

"So ... what?"

"First, put your comm back on long enough to let Rip know we're still alive before he sends someone else and things really get messed up."

He sighs, for her benefit (he knows she's right), moves back to a quiet-ish corner (she follows), turns the earpiece on, and drawls "Hunter. We're fine. We'll be back in a while. Don't wait up."

A moment of silence, then, "What the _**hell**_ ..."

He turns the comm off again and smirks at the woman at his side.

Right on cue, the band strikes up. She can't hide the smile. "Do you want to dance, Leonard?"

He doesn't say a word; she doesn't really expect him to. But he does put down his mostly finished glass of champagne and extends a hand to her.

Her eyebrows rise. But she takes it, and he whirls them both out onto the dance floor, pulling her as close as he dares.

After a few silent moments, she says, with a tone of surprise, "You're a very good dancer."

"Mmm. Job skill."

"I don't want to know, do I?"

"Probably not."

After the first song, they hold a quiet conversation, planning things out. Stay for an hour or more, making sure they're seen. Once it's dark out, smuggle their sleeping counterparts home under cover of darkness and head back to the WaveRider. That leads to awkward speculation about whether "they" live together; the consensus is, yes, probably.

In the silence that follows, they decide to take a break. He finds them both another glass of champagne and returns to find Sara bantering with a man he pegs as "asshole" from the minute he sees him.

She gives him the "I got this" look. Oh, _this_ should be amusing.

"Oh, **no** , Ms. Lance, I'm not saying the funding should be **completely** cut, but you have to admit, the money could be better spent, say, on people who **want** to be saved and not people who stay in these 'relationships' ..."

"Oh, really ..."

Her tone is sweet as sugar. She's going to eviscerate the man. Not literally. He hopes.

He leans against the wall and enjoys the figurative bloodshed. Asshole can barely get a word in; she's cutting every one of his arguments off at the knees. He approves.

His mother died in her "relationship" ... a pretty word for the hell that was her life with his father. She'd been too scared, too cowed, with few other skills, no other family, no other resources, and two children ... as little as she'd managed to protect them ... to run, even walk, away.

Wait, did Mr. Mansplainer _really_ just step into Sara's space? He watches her eyes flash and her fingers twitch as her chin goes up ...

He gives her a look of apology and cuts back in.

The bastard looks pissed. He's so tempted to let Sara go all White Canary on his ass, but that would probably truly screw things up.

"Don't you have somewhere else to be?" His tone is downright chilly and his eyes are narrowed, and for half a second, the councilman (or at least a certain amount of animal instinct buried in his DNA) registers the danger he just might be in, from both of them. His eyes go wide.

Then his perception of "reality" reasserts itself. This is the mayor and his pretty blond fiancée! What danger could he possibly be in?

The councilman turns away, chuckling uncomfortably, wondering why his heart rate has skyrocketed.

He watches the man go, then looks at Sara. He's relieved to see a smile; she understands why he did what he did.

"That was probably not a good idea," he allows. But they share a grin anyway.

"Maybe. But I can't imagine a universe, any universe, in which either of us deal with fools ... especially that fool ... kindly, so it can't be much of a surprise to him." She takes a sip of her champagne.

This time, he notices she's wearing the ring.

She follows his gaze and goes still.

"Well ... it's part of the 'costume,' isn't it? I'll put it back."

"Mmm." He catches her hand, raises it to get a better look. At least two carats, gorgeous workmanship.

"He has good taste." The words leave his mouth before he really thinks about them. Her eyebrows go up again, and he coughs.

He doesn't backtrack, though. Instead, he invites her to dance again.

xxx

He pulls her a tiny bit closer this time. She smirks, but only warns, "There are knives."

He shifts his hand on her back a tiny bit, leans closer. "I'd be disappointed if there weren't."

xxx

Later, the actual Earth-2 Leonard Snart will learn that his approval ratings went up by a number of points that week, spurred in part by the public's fascination with his obvious infatuation with the woman at his side at the police event. It's a crack in his usually ... chilly ... public persona.

Amused and surprised, he takes it to heart.

Their relationship is the better for it.

xxx

They make their escape once the event is winding down and it's safely dark outside. Their doubles are still safely passed out in the backseat.

ID confirms an address in the nicer part of Central City, the part where if young Leonard Snart visited at all, it was only for breaking and entering. He tries not to show how unnerved he is by this.

They park close, get the door open, carry their opposite numbers inside quickly. Neither of them can look the other in the eye as they arrange the pair in a comfortable sprawl on the king bed in the master bedroom.

Likewise, neither of them is very comfortable taking a closer look at the house's contents, the assorted artifacts of different lives, of two people making a life with each other. Snart pauses just once, to take a closer look at a framed photo of Lisa that holds a prominent place in the living room. She's wearing a graduation gown and cap. She looks happy, and his double is standing next to her, looking proud.

He sighs.

Sara slips the ring back onto the finger of her own double and pauses for a moment, staring at her, an odd, disturbed look on her face. He goes to stand next to her. Show of support.

Finally, she speaks. "She never went on the Gambit. She never joined the league. She never ... saw the inside of the Lazarus Pit. I wish I knew ... is that what I was supposed to be?"

He speaks without thinking again. She tends to do that to him. "You **are** who you're supposed to be. She's a different person, and you're stronger than she's ever had to be.

"I'd rather know you."

He can hear the sincerity in his own voice, and a bit more truth than he'd intended to show. Her eyes go to his face, but she doesn't say anything.

A few minutes later, they leave the home, that comfortable existence, behind them and head back out into the night.

xxx

They're almost back to the WaveRider when she says, nonchalantly, "So, did you kiss her?"

"No." She looks immensely skeptical, so he clarifies. "She kissed me. No worries." Smirk. "I was a gentleman."

"Of course." Irony heavy in her tone. "Good kiss?"

"Mmm." He shrugs. "OK."

"Just OK?"

He eyes her as if there's something he'd like to say but doesn't. "OK."

"Hmph. OK, then." The field where the WaveRider is "parked" is just ahead. She slows her steps just a little, then stops. So does he. "Then, just for comparison purposes ..."

And she grabs the lapels of his suit coat, pulls his head down, and kisses _him_.

xxx

She's not quite sure why she does it. Maybe she's still trying to convince herself that the unscarred, successful, sparkling woman they've just left is not, inarguably, the better Sara Lance in all things that matter in the real world, the world where hunting down immortal despots and taking out bad guys and doing general property damage are not actual job skills.

Maybe because the light in his eyes when he realized it was _her_ in the ballroom and not the other Sara is something she's still digesting.

But whyever she does it, it doesn't really matter.

The whole damned thing gets a little out of control just about immediately.

xxx

It's nothing like kissing the other Sara.

If he's honest, the best part of that earlier kiss had been the moment before his intellect had caught up to his hindbrain and reminded him that it wasn't, really, her. It had been a perfectly ... nice ... kiss.

This one is not ... nice.

Sara Lance, the one he knows, kisses like she fights, with challenge and a little bit of aggression and great skill. He's gone almost immediately, wrapping one arm around her waist, tangling his other hand in her hair.

She doesn't pull away. If anything, she leans closer.

xxx

Neither of them is quite sure how long they've been standing there ... involved ... when there is a sudden seemingly mutual decision to back away before someone comes looking for them.

They're both a bit flushed; they're both breathing more than a bit heavily. She looks at him for a long moment, face unreadable but eyes wide, then takes a deep breath and turns away, heading toward the WaveRider.

After a moment, he follows.

xxx

Hunter is incredibly pissed off at both of them. (They pretty much ignore this.) The others aren't well pleased, either.

But they've gathered enough information that Gideon is able to pinpoint which variant Earth they're on and how to get home, and soon enough the WaveRider is back to where it should be, and the mission goes on.

Neither of them ever lets on what happened there. Who they were. What they did.

No one else really needs to know.

xxx

Their Earth2 doubles wake with a good five hours lost. As predicted, they freak out only to each other. The brain has a way of rejecting the "impossible" and replacing it with something far more plausible.

By all accounts, after all, they spent a perfectly normal evening together at the police event. They even took Councilman Lowman down a few pegs. (This is a common occurrence, really. And it's sort of refreshing how he treats them both with a bit more trepidation thereafter.)

It must have been a bad batch of champagne or something. Right?

(Sara later confides a little about the strangeness of that evening to Iris Allen-West, who doesn't think much of it at the time. But after her own strange experiences of a few months later, she wonders.)

At any rate, they move on. They do good for their city. They wonder about that night, sometimes, but not too much.

They live, as the stories say, happily ever after.

xxx

 **Author's note** : Dedicated to the strong, brave women who once allowed me to interview them about why they stayed, and how they left.

So many people wanted to see this expand to the wider Earth-2 that I feel a little bad it stayed so short and so centered around these two. (It was just really a little thought experiment that got out of hand, like so much of what I write!) So I may revisit it at some point after the shows are done for the season. Thanks for reading!


End file.
